Come Back for Me (Arrowood Brothers #1)(75)

“I’ll give you everything you want.”

I shake my head. “All I want is you.”

I lean up on my toes and bring our lips together. He has no idea how frantically my heart is pounding in my chest or how him saying those words was enough to bring me to my knees, but it did. The trust I have in us is staggering.

Never before did I think I would be able to do that. Being vulnerable is scary and raw. Too many times, I’ve tried to avoid it because I learned that, when you allow another person to have the power to hurt you, they will.

However, I don’t think he will.

He would never hurt me—not intentionally.

Connor’s hands move from my arms up to my neck so he can tilt my face and deepen the kiss. He walks us backward, our mouths still together until I hit the bed.

“Lie down,” he instructs.

I do as he asks and slide onto my back. He doesn’t follow, though. He stands back, looking down at me. “Please don’t make me beg,” I say with a shaky breath.

I need him. No matter what tonight proves in regards to how we are together now, I need him.

“Never. I will never make you beg.”

“Then love me.”

“Always. Even though I don’t deserve you, I want you to know that you own my heart.”

“And you own mine.”

“God, I hope so.”

Before I can think too much about that, he moves to me and lifts my shirt from my body. I also made sure I wore matching underwear, so Connor finds a deep purple bra with lace that barely covers anything.

“Jesus Christ,” he says under his breath and then his mouth is on my neck.

He kisses his way down but doesn’t move the fabric. His warm mouth covers my very hard nipple through the lace, giving me so many different sensations all at once.

There’s the scrape of the lace against my overly sensitive nipple mixed with the wetness from his tongue finding my skin the fabric doesn’t cover. My fingers are in his hair, and my eyes are closed as I allow myself to get lost to him.

He moves to the other side, and his fingers tuck under the strap as he slowly pulls it down. The feel of his callused hands on my skin is overwhelming.

“You want more, Angel?” he asks as his mouth moves back up to my ear.

“Yes, I want it all.”

His groan is husky as he drags his lips down the column of my neck. “Then you’ll get all I have. Every-fucking-thing that I am will be yours.”

He pulls the other side of my bra down, exposing my breasts to him. His tongue darts out, circling around my nipple, and then he takes it into his mouth, lavishing it with heat.

I could die. I thought what we did the last time was hot, but being in his bed, where everything around me is his, is almost too much.

I can’t breathe without smelling his cologne. I can’t open my eyes without seeing something that’s his. And I feel him. Everywhere.

His hand moves down the front of my body to my jeans. Slowly, he undoes the button, and the sound of the zipper is loud, but it’s nothing compared to the sound of my breathing. I’m so turned on.

Connor watches me, and I nod, letting him know I still want this. He glides my pants down, removing my underwear too, and I’ve never felt more exposed and liberated at the same time.

He looks at me as though I’m a priceless piece of art that he’s won. Lips parted and eyes warm as his gaze caresses my bare body.

“You humble me, Ellie.” His voice is thick with emotion.

I don’t say anything for fear of breaking out in tears, and wouldn’t that be the most embarrassing thing ever? So, I sit up and brush my fingertips along the slope of his jaw before dropping them to the hem of his shirt and lifting it.

The last time we fooled around, I didn’t get this part. He wouldn’t let me touch him, and this time, we’re going to be equals. It’s only fair to have him naked too.

We both move slowly, savoring the seconds that we have. I don’t need to rush tonight, in fact, if I could, I’d put it in slow motion, allowing every single moment to last a little longer.

Connor is absolutely breathtaking without a shirt on. I know it isn’t a manly word, but that’s all I have. My brain is scrambled as I look over the finest male specimen I could ever dream of.

Each muscle is firm, and the skin strains against them. His stomach is all ridges and valleys that my fingers itch to explore. The muscles on his arms are thick, and even though they’ve been wrapped around my body as they held me, I didn’t fully grasp how powerful they were.

I trace the tips of my fingers from his forearm up to his shoulders and then down his stomach, enjoying the flexing of the muscles as I touch him. He’s holding perfectly still, allowing me to explore, so I move to his other arm and look at the tattoo on his shoulder. “What does this mean?”

It’s a series of what look like Celtic knots in the shape of a triangle. “It’s the symbol of brotherhood.”

“It looks like the spear of an arrow and is beautiful.”

His smile is soft. “Each of us has one.”

I lean forward and press my lips to it. Then I get up on my knees and go around to his back, needing to see every inch of skin he has on display. I find another tattoo right below his shoulder blade. “And this?”

My fingers trace the black ink of the skeleton of a frog holding a trident of some sort. “That’s a tattoo that SEALs get when we lose someone in the line of duty. It’s a bone frog because we are frogmen.”